The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1887-03-12

the F0Of OF MS s60ur rif-laW;; j; ana mere
he died In the fear Il necessity. ali
though he had drawn more salaries,
up to the time Of his death, than
any American who had@ver lived in
the public employment.
] rode some twelve miles out of
Nashville 10 see General Jackson's
'uD>mitage.n end narveled at the
spot where h fpitehed his home. and
at the ruin na }had made in the
condition of hisadopted children and
their families.
He. too, though he exercised more
personal power than any ofour Pres
Its. and destroyed arbitrarily
fiscai institutions like the Uni
ted Srtes Bank. had to be hor.
ssu# som some Of his Office holders
having failed 70 continue TO the end
OF his life the commercial character
he sustained in his earlier years as
an industrious trader, jockey and
planter.
His successor. Van Buren, derived
from his Holland Dutch parents a
genuine love of his local village and
its scenes and having been a thrifty
careful man who had made a fortune
at the bar and from saving his public
salaries, he had means to extend and
ornament a rather superior house
when he retired. but | found it pos
sessed by farmer who TOOK not the
least interest in the story of Van
Buren, and would not let stranger
pry into the dwelling.
The old man visited and moved
about until age overlook him and his
faculties began to be seriously i'm
paired, and So he glided into the
grave after the commencement of the
great civil war, almost as much un-
known as if he had been some colo
nial governor of New York.
In his case, too, his real story is
not to be found at Kinderhook. but
in the statutes and archives of the
country. You will know more about
him from picking up some stray and
forgotten volume than by atternpt-
ing to arouse and stimulate the rem
iniscences of his neighbors.
President Harrison is not to be
seen in the Western localities, where
he had his abodes, but in the pages
of development Of all that great
West of which he was the youthful
guardian, and in the visage of his
descendant who still occupies the
public councils.
John Tyler lived a long while after
his time. and was one of the most
successful American Office holders.
but the solitary vestige of him which
attracts attention is his widow.
Mr.. Polk has also left a widow, a
most interesting lady. who bore him
no children, and choosing his home
steal in the large town of Nashville,
he has a certain degree of perma-
nence, like a print which was not
thrown away in a portfolio or a
drawer, but was supplied with a
frame and hung upon the wall to sur,
vive another generation. He had his
tomb made in his front yard, in the
midst of Nashville society-a curious
thing and curiously placed. Though
the Mexican war WIS fought in his
administration, and great territory
added to the Union, his papers and
letters remain untouched, the busy
hand of succeeding times not having
had the impetus or curiosity to GO
back and arrange the story of his
deeds, on which he set so much store.
Mr.. Fillmore also lived in a city
comparatively small in his day, but
which has grown to be a very large
piuSCs anu III no lepiu dCtlOh Ilcillicl
stranger nor citizen thinks to make
inquiry about life which he cousid.
cred no5ly rounded and compromised
into powerful national liniaments.
have several times been at Mr.
Buchanan's old homestead. near the
edge of the town of Lancaster, where
he practiced law and accumulated an
independence. II did furnish him g
home for the eight or nine years fol
lowing his term of the chief magis'
tracy, but after making an attempt
to hold it sacred, his family success.
sors finally felt they could no longer
stand the sacrifice, and they sold it tC
a stranger.
Change is written on nothing 81
much as public life. The homes anC
associations which endure are almost
invariably those of the unsuccessful
or those who might have been con,
sidered failures in career.
Yet there is philosophy in all this
for he who barterS the private for tht
public station abandons his real home
and makes his home in the hOson n